Senior living providers must listen to their residents and earn their trust, according to Sara Terry, Brookdale’s senior vice president of resident and family engagement and experience. Terry recently joined a panel of senior living experts to discuss how organizations and the industry as a whole are changing.
“We welcome and encourage the increased engagement of residents,” Terry said. “In fact, that’s one of our ways of measuring success. Our strategy is to earn resident and family trust by providing valued, high-quality care and personalized service. We value feedback from our residents and families, and ensure we show how much we care by acting on it and resolving any issues promptly.”
The panelists spoke during a session titled “Transforming Organization in a Changing Industry” at HealthTAC East 2019, an invitation-only conference held in Nassau, Bahamas, April 7-9. The event brought together for-profit and non-profit leaders and key decision-makers to review and talk about innovative products and services. The conference drew about 1,000 attendees from across the country.
Read more about the HealthTAC conference on Senior Living News.
(Terry, second from left, joined Amy Birkel, Melissa Banko and Jack York on the panel.
Photo courtesy of Senior Living News.)
During their discussion, panelists presented thoughts on how the use of technology, design and architecture, analytics, millennials and a largely female workforce are transforming senior living. Brookdale has roughly 75,000 associates and 75 percent are women.
“We also know that 65 percent of our residents are women and 80 percent of healthcare decisions are made by women,” Terry said. “So it makes sense to emphasize gender diversity at the very top of the organization to set the tone from the top.” Brookdale is a standout in corporate America, with a woman CEO (Lucinda Baier) and four out of eight board members being women.
Terry also discussed Brookdale’s position as the nation’s largest memory care provider and creator of unique programs and services that support those living with dementia.
